A frustrating afternoon at Loftus Road where Alex Neil’s Millwall went to work on a very effective Championship away performance and win that ends Rangers’ unbeaten run of six and continues their own impressive form on the road.

Another unbeaten run comes to an end, another push into the play-off picture falls flat, another afternoon spent at Loftus Road watching a full away end have a lovely day.

There is little to be said for a 12.30 kick off against Millwall at the best of times, and when you’re 2-0 down at the break against an Alex Neil side far more schooled in the art of destroying a second half than a rookie referee is in preventing that from happening, these are not the best of times.

A 2-1 home loss in a London ‘derby’ is going to be a frustrating thing, and there was much to be frustrated about in Shepherd’s Bush on Saturday morning.

I’ve learned from experience never to over-react to the line-ups when they’re announced – rant in haste, repent at leisure – but it was a disappointment to see Julien Stéphan, for me, repeat a lot of the mistakes he made here for the last, similarly sludgy, home game against Oxford.

That night the ‘threat’ of a Gary Rowett team and Michal Helik at set pieces saw Rangers go big, square and stodgy, with Michi Frey up front alongside Richard Kone, Isaac Hayden and Sam Field together in midfield, Steve Cook back in the defence. Lads, it’s Oxford. You’re mitigating for an opposition attack against an opponent that doesn’t have an attack. It completely hobbled QPR’s own forward ambition until the hour mark where a series of substitutions forced the R’s into something like the shape they should have been in to start with. It wasn’t enough to win the game, two points dropped at home to a very limited side, and Helik could/should have scored from a set piece anyway.

I don’t mind mistakes. Marti Cifuentes spent two years learning about the Championship on our time and takes that learning with him to Leicester. We now have to sit through a new guy from the French league doing things you and I know won’t work while he founds out for himself. I do, however, mind mistakes being repeated. The big takeaway from the Oxford dirge was it’s Kone or Frey with Burrell or Kolli. Do not cross the streams. To put Frey and Kone together again against anybody, and expect a different result, was the definition of footballing madness. Stéphan’s faith in a big lump/big lump partnership against Millwall I would charitably describe as touching.

What followed was… what you would expect. QPR, who have scored the fewest goals from crosses in the league so far this season, stuck in a whole load of crosses. These mostly came from Harvey/Acton Vale, repeatedly after inverting inside and checking back onto his left foot, and exclusively onto the head of man mountain Jake Cooper to head away. Paul Smyth, arguably QPR’s biggest threat, made much better going of things down the left. He might have scored after 25 seconds with a crisp volley off a Frey touch down from a quick Dunne throw, and hit the top of the bar with visiting keeper Max Crocombe giving it a big Robert Green leave, but he too grew increasingly frustrated, chucked himself to the ground too readily, and might hear more this week about a sly off-the-ball elbow on Ryan Leonard in the second half.

Frey was a maddening presence long before his 61st minute hooking, which was about 51 minutes overdue. When he wasn’t occupying the same spaces as Kone and trying to do the same job as the Ivorian – leading to increasingly testy exchanges between the two – he was left to tear after channel balls in that weird bottom-half-having-a-row-with-the-top-half running style of his which inevitably ended up with the ball embarrassingly running off into touch with him in lukewarm pursuit several times. Two trucks, overtaking, A1 past Scotch corner, forever and ever, and ever and ever, and ever and ever more. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Gear change. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Like the oldest dad in the dads and lads match, difficult not to feel sorry for him. It’s not his game. He shouldn’t be asked to do that. We have other players now for that role, and why they were all sitting watching with me is a big of a mystery to be honest.

Rumarn Burrell is chief among them. He’s got a first touch that would make quite a nice penalty, but his work rate, pace, and ceaselessness makes him a plague and a pest for Championship defences. He created a goal for himself after being summoned from the bench, hassling and winning possession over by the dugouts, feeding it intelligently and rejoining the attack at speed, staying onside to convert fellow sub Koki Saito’s square pass into an empty net. A full goal. Counts as one. He should have equalised, with his head, after Jimmy Dunne nodded a late scramble back across goal.

That’s what threat looks like. If he cannot play, because of injury, because of squad rotation, or because of this notion that a business class flight to Jamaica for zero minutes of international football apparently renders him wholly incapable of finding his own arse with both hands, then play somebody of a similar profile.

Rayan Kolli rewarded for an excellent cameo at Bristol City with a watching brief of Michi Frey trying to run channels. Look and learn son. I don’t like all the noise around him online from reps and family members, particularly during the transfer window, but if I was him standing down there watching that I’d be considering my options as well. The Algerian international pointedly continued his warmup even after QPR had made all their subs. If not him, then Koki Saito could play that role. Running, hassling, pressing high, chasing lost causes, collecting channel balls. Michi Frey cannot. It’s like Ferrari running a District Line train in the Bahrain Grand Prix – that’s it Lewis, Dagenham, another bit of Dagenham, Hornchurch, vrrrummm vrrrrmmmm off you go.

Which is more, Millwall scored from a set piece anyway – just as Oxford should have done. So you’re handicapping yourself to prevent something that then happens regardless.

Personally, if we’re at home, I’d play our game and make them worry about us a bit more. In the land of the giants, be a swarm of bees. If you are going to try and match them up, don’t concede the sort of spoon-fed warm slop goal Rangers shipped deep into first half injury time. Millwall left two on one at a simple throw in, a cross into the box inadvertently flicked on past Steve Cook by Jonathan Varane, and Mihailo Ivanovic scores from two yards out with Rhys Norrington-Davies wrong side and Paul Nardi rooted to his line as per. A striker without a goal in nine appearances so far this season, because of course.

You’d struggle to pinpoint a worse defensive goal in the Championship this weekend, if you hadn’t seen an even more egregious example a few minutes before.

Eastenders’ Billy Mitchell given all the time he wanted to knock a through ball unchallenged, Norrington-Davies asleep and allowing Femi Azeez to run off him, Steve Cook caught square and slow, and Nardi stuck on his line once more. The French keeper seems to have copped the bulk of the blame for this one online, and from his defenders at the time, but Azeez brought the ball out of the air outside the area – are we expecting Nardi to come out and challenge for a header there? I think Cook and RND are looking for scapegoats for their own failings personally. Nardi had already bailed Jonathan Varane out with a tremendous save from Will Smallbone after the Frenchman clumsily trod on the ball, and Ivanovic really should have scored already from another Azeez cross after Nicolas Madsen gave the ball away.

It was for a large part the tale of two back fours. Rangers repeatedly missed Amadou Mbengue’s recovery pace in behind – particularly for the first goal but on several other occasions too. Stéphan's willingness to leave him out also confuses me. Liam Morrison’s eye-rolling second half trip to the treatment room after an injury hit 2024/25 might force the manager's hand at Swansea on Wednesday, had Mbengue not pretty clearly stamped on Langstaff near the end which will, like Smyth, also interest the video review panel. QPR looked thoroughly ropey back there all afternoon to me.

By contrast, Millwall’s backline, with third choice goalkeeper Max Crocombe handed the gloves, looked largely in control and comfortable. Cooper looks like he was grown in a lab and Tristan Crama alongside him was pretty immaculate. Nonsense to see big lads like this rolling round on the floor pretending they’re hurt to run the clock down - you’d get laughed out of most rugby league games and plenty of Bermondsey pubs for such cuntery - but the solution is don’t go 2-0 down to them in the first place. They’re what you want the middle of your defence to look like, and this is a team that had its best centre back pinched by Sheff Utd on deadline day, remember.

There was plenty to pick fault with on the home side. Varane’s tendency to turn back and inside, take an extra touch or three, play a safe sideways or backwards ball, rather than progressing play through a run or a riskier pass, basically makes him a more Twitter-friendly version of Sam Field on days like Saturday. Field wouldn’t have survived that sort of performance in QPR’s online world any more than Smyth would playing like Harvey Vale did here. But I think it is important, sometimes, to acknowledge your opposition.

Millwall, by Neil’s own admission, didn’t play particularly well. They were reduced to wasting time at 2-1 and going through that performative nonsense where we all collude in the illusion the goalkeeper is hurt so we can have an impromptu knitting circle round the dug outs – one of many things rookie ref Adam Herczeg has shown before he’s wholly incapable of judging and controlling, along with telling the difference between a foul (such as the one Rhys Norrington Davies suffered when booked for diving) or a dive (such as Richard Kone’s obvious flop which saw Cooper yellow carded in the first half) – when they really needn’t have been. They’re a decent side, unbeaten away from home so far. We tipped them for the top six this year and I thought you could see why here.

We talk about trying to win games while losing midfield a lot, Dave Mc mentions what happens once opposition scouts have watched a bit of tape of your fancy new idea on the West London Sport Podcast all the time – both were in evidence on Saturday. Varane was poor, Madsen was passable, but Millwall were well on top through that middle corridor, numerically and ability wise. Massimo Luongo had started the game superbly on his former stomping ground before a very nasty looking potential ACL injury that we wish one of our club’s recent good guys, and a vastly underrated player, all the best with. Casper De Norre came on for him and fitted in seamlessly. Billy Mitchell had the place to himself. Will Smallbone, who’s been to Harvey Vale’s barber, was a cut above what QPR had at their disposal – Southampton are good enough to have him out on loan, are they? Hmmm. Not for me, Clive.

With the two goals they scored, the Ivanovic miss, Smallbone save and a bizarre incident at the back post where Azeez somehow missed the ball altogether when the goal was gaping, the Lions were unfortunate to only be two goals up at half time. And that’s with QPR really looking quite sprightly and promising for much of the first 30, and Wawll apparently not playing very well.

They’re a club a little bit ahead of us in the cycle. They’ve pulled in £30m+ in sales over the last couple of years for the likes of Zian Flemming, Romain Esse and Japhet Tanganga. Not only that but they’ve already got the next cab off the rank – Ivanovic slipping into Flemming’s shoes despite a recent drought, Crama already there and playing right back for a bit last year ready to slide across when Tanganga gets poached. That’s where we need to get to – selling players (players plural) for big wedges, reinvesting and already having your next prospect in the building. That’s how you go unbeaten away, get into the top six, win 2-1 at Loftus Road, while not playing well, and carrying a load of injuries (marquee summer addition Alfie Doughty made a late sub cameo here having been out since game two and they’re already onto a third goalkeeper of the year). That’s why I quite fancy them this year. That’s why we lost to them on Saturday. Just that bit better than we are, just that little bit further ahead of us. And Neil’s teams are always ball-achingly well prepared anyway (not Stoke, obviously, never Stoke).

So, I’m pretty at peace with it – as much as you can ever be at peace with losing at home to Millwall.

Burrell’s late header could easily have salvaged a point. There were chunky penalty shouts in the first half for a barge on Kone, and second half for a hack at Saito, that I don’t think particularly were penalties, except that this referee will penalise everything outside the box and then declare a free-for-all once you cross that white line. He’d have given both those incidents as free kicks. It’s either a foul or it’s not a foul. I feels like with him you’re officiated to two different standards depending where you are on the pitch. The Kone dive for Cooper yellow card, and Leonard foul on Norington Davies for a diving booking, another example of his twirling, twirling, twirling towards madness. If I was more of a cynic I’d suggest that simulation card was a result of him realising Leonard was already booked and had he awarded the free kick he’d probably have to send him off. Paul Smyth elbows a guy off the ball, missed entirely, stops the game for a head injury, restarts with a Millwall free kick he’d never awarded. Mbengue stamps on a geezer’s thigh, QPR free kick. Adam Herczeg, sadly, not really up to this level at this stage of his career.

Either of those pens awarded, QPR also take a point – or more. I know it’s difficult when they’re chucking out brain rot like Steve Cook trying a we’ve-all-had-a-drink bicycle kick, or the increasingly infuriating Karamoko Dembele hoiking on a full Tony Yeboah attempt into the Upper Loft, but we’re not a million miles away. Bar Coventry, every game this season has been within the margin of error. Slinging a load of crosses in against Cooper and Crama was dumb. Starting Kone and Frey together again was poor. But it’s not easy being a manager when Dembele comes on against Sheff Wed and changes the game, then plays the next week like his shoes are tied together; Vale is borderline man of the match off the bench at Bristol City, then plays like he’s got lead in his feet here; Saito wins the game against Charlton, anonymous against Sheff Wed, sparkling against Oxford, pretty anonymous here. We can’t quite get the consistency in performance or selection from our wide players at the moment.

We are a work in progress. It's another game QPR have lost with more of the possession – 58% give or take. Their last eight wins have all come with less of the ball, and Millwall really did upon to us as we would do unto them. I guess trying to take Millwall on at 4-4-2 and crosses was always likely to lead to that. I’m reminded of that Tony Gale story, breaking through as a teenage centre back at West Ham, being told to get the Luton centre forward leathered nice and early because he won’t want to know after that. It was Mick Harford. It’s like that is it? Okay. You like crosses do you? Alright.

Still, I think we’ll win more games than not playing as we did for big chunks of Saturday. Big test of that theory coming with two aways to come this week, mind.

Links >>> Photo Gallery >>> Ratings and Reports >>> Message Board Match Thread

QPR: Nardi 5; Dunne 6, Morrison 5 (Mbengue 54, 6), Cook 5, Norrington-Davies 5; Vale 5 (Dembele 54, 5), Varane 5 (Morgan 72, 6), Madsen 6, Smyth 6 (Saito 61, 6); Kone 6, Frey 5 (Burrell 61, 6)

Subs not used: Field, Hamer, Hayden, Kolli,

Goals: Burrell 85 (assisted Saito)

Yellow Cards: Norrington-Davies 55 (dive), Smyth 59 (foul)

Millwall: Crocombe 6; Leonard 6; Crama 7, Cooper 7, Sturge 6; Luongo – (De Norre 15, 7 (Cundle 79, -)), Mitchell 7; Azeez 7 (Neghli 75, 6), Smallbone 7, Ballo 6 (Doughty 74, 6); Ivanovic 7 (Langstaff 80, -)

Subs Not Used: Bryan, Coleman, Emakhu, Taylor

Goals: Azeez 36 (assisted Mitchell), Ivanovic 45+4 (unassisted)

Yellow Cards: Leonard 33 (foul), Cooper 39 (foul), Ballo 56 (foul)

QPR Star Man – Rumarn Burrell 6 Scored, might have scored again, we are a much better team with him on the pitch. If you’re not going to pick him because of injury, rotation, international duty, or whatever the reason, pick a similar hard working, quick, pressing profile – Koli, Saito even – don’t go with two big lumps. Once, okay, twice, hmmm, do it three times and I’ll be cross.

Referee - Adam Herczeg (Durham) 5 Not sure how referees learn and gain experience without being plunged in out of their depth a few times, but he is very clearly, very obviously not up to this level and this intensity of game at this stage of his career.

Attendance: 17,408 (1,800 Millwall approx.) Full house, London derby, absolutely dead for the most part. Into the sea with 12.30 kick offs. Thankfully our last at home for a while.

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Pictures - Ian Randall Photography

Myke added 23:47 - Oct 19 Cheers Clive, very measured response in a hysteria driven (virtual) world. Tad harsh on Frey, set up a wonderful chance early on. But do agree with the overall thesis that he and Kone can't operate at the same time. Think when Chair is fully fit, JS will revert to one striker anyway, with Chair tucked in behind and Burrell the impact sub.
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stowmarketrange added 23:49 - Oct 19 To be fair to their keeper,he was on all fours stretching his calves for a lot of the time in the 2nd half,but I don’t know if he was genuinely injured or not.Only he knows the answer to that one,but some of the acting by a few Millwall players should’ve been rewarded with Oscars. Most of us could see that Kone and Frey together didn’t work before,so why was Julian expecting it to work this time?

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gazza1 added 08:08 - Oct 20 Good chat about consistency Norf, important if we are going to win things. And makes it more difficult for JS but he cannot keep making errors himself because he could be classed as inconsistent as well.
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Geoff78 added 15:31 - Oct 20 I'm not sure this is a convincing argument but I wondered if Stephan thought he should give the Kone/Frey combo another chance, and if your going to do that Millwall is the team to test it on. What was he told about how Millwall play? He wouldn't know much about them. But whatever it was clear by half time (or earlier) that it wasn't working so surely one of the alternatives could have been put on then. I also find it worrying that Kolli isn't getting any (hardly any) game time. It can only improve him and/or increase his value when we do sell. And in case he has a lot to offer the team

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Marshy added 19:36 - Oct 20 After watching Frey’s snail like performance you do wonder why players that can’t run are recruited in the first place. No one would expect him to have the blistering pace of Burrell, there aren’t too many players that have that, but watching him chase balls that he hasn’t a cats chance in hell of getting was pitiful. So playing him alongside Kone a player I really like, but is also short on pace, was not very logical. Where was Kolli. At least that boy can shift. We didn’t get a grip of the midfield all afternoon. I’d consider dropping Varane and bringing back Field, and see how gets on alongside Madsen. Overall the reason we lost against Millwall was mainly team selection, but also the fact that as always, we created plenty of chances but failed to take them. Ironically whilst we now have the best forward options for many years, I think scoring enough goals this season could be our downfall.

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extratimeR added 22:58 - Oct 20 Yes spot on about Frey, really surprised he started against a pacey side like Millwall. ( Yes, noticed the exchanges between Kone and Frey, no point Frey complaining where he wants the ball, if he is to slow to arrive their). I was pleased with a lot, but surprised at no Burrell, big mistake. Cheers Clive, great report!
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LLoydy added 13:20 - Oct 21 Perhaps the Kone/Frey thing - which did to me feel like a plausible option here - is much like the Vale/Saito bit where you don't know which versions you'll get and if it works all of a sudden you're a genuis for giving it a go. Where I am not so sympathetic is Varane keep going backwards, Madsen might not have had a great game but at least he always tried to turn towards the opposition goal. I try to like Varane too, he's clearly a personable chap and controls well but but he needs his compass resetting

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